Human Aging

Abstract

Of all the potential disasters and scourges that threaten mankind—famine, nuclear war, collision of Earth with meteoroids, and many others—none seems as impending as the aging human population. According to data and projections released recently by the Population Division of the United Nations’ Department of Economic and Social Affairs (1), the world population in 1998 was 5.9 billion. By the time this book is published, it will be well over 6 billion. The projected, “most likely” estimate for the year 2050 is 8.9 billion. It took 12 years, from 1987 to 1999, to add 1 billion people to the world’s population. In another 50 years, 3 billion more persons will be alive. What should be considered startling, indeed alarming, are the expected increases in the aging and aged segments of the population. In 1998, 66 million persons in the world were over 80 years of age (Table 1-1). That number is projected to rise almost sixfold, to 370 million persons by the year 2050. The number of centenarians will reach 2.2 million by 2050, a 16-fold increase over the number in 1998.

Then the Lord said, “My spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days will be a hundred and twenty years.”

—Genesis 6:3